Biotech Company To Attempt Revitalizing Nervous Systems of Brain-Dead Patients (telegraph.co.uk)

Sarah Knapton, writing for The Telegraph: A groundbreaking trial to see if it is possible to regenerate the brains of dead people, has won approval from health watchdogs. A biotech company called BioQuark in the U.S. has been granted ethical permission to recruit 20 patients who have been declared clinically dead from a traumatic brain injury, to test whether parts of their central nervous system can be brought back to life. Scientists will use a combination of therapies, which include injecting the brain with stem cells and a cocktail of peptides, as well as deploying lasers and nerve stimulation techniques which have been shown to bring patients out of comas. The trial participants will have been certified dead and only kept alive through life support. They will be monitored for several months using brain imaging equipment to look for signs of regeneration, particularly in the upper spinal cord -- the lowest region of the brain stem which controls independent breathing and heartbeat.

Comments

Re:US Congress

[foradoxium]

I was with you until you started picking sides. We all know all of congress has brains that would qualify for this, not just a particular side.

Re:The ultimate terror: Locked-in syndrome

[Wycliffe]

I'm frightened that they'll turn comatose/brain-dead people into locked-in people. I consider the latter a fate worse than death.

I was thinking something similar. What exactly happens if they get this person 10% functioning again? Is euthanasia legal for someone previously declared dead or are they now forced to keep this half alive person alive? What if they regain their brain but not their memory (see the book Worthing Saga). Is this a desirable outcome where you have an adult with the brain of an infant that now has to relearn everything? Even if it's 100% and they can eventually return to normal intelligence, you now have 10+ years of learning to walk, read, write, and all the other things we learn in childhood. I'm not even sure that is a desirable outcome.

Re:US Congress

[TheCarp]

> Republican members of Congress are there because money paid for them to be there.

The word "Republican" is irrelevant to the truth of this statement. With, or without this word, the statement is factually true.